28 Porcelain Clay. 
ART. XV.—Porcelain Clay 7 
TO THE EDITOR. 
_ AGREEABLY to your request, I send you some account of 
the bed of clay, of which I forwarded you specimens some 
time since. I am not able to ascertain certainly that it is 
porcelain clay. A box of it has been sent to the porcelain 
manufactory, near New-York, but no return has been made 
in relation to it. The account may, however, be useful to 
some who are interested in the manufacture of this beautiful 
are. 
This clay is very white, and fine like flour—melts* with 
ease before the blow-pipe—readily forms a paste with water 
used like lime, for a wash or paint, adheres strongly to 
~~ wood, and gives it a fine white—so tenacious as a thick paste, 
as to be employed with some success as a substitute for the 
common 7 
this College. It is ina valley, having Pownal mountain on 
the east and south, and is covered with a light and sandy 
soil, which extends to some distance about it. The principal 
stones about the place are masses of rolled quartz. Small 
masses of quartz, of irregular shape, are imbedded in the 
vy, with 
exposure to the air. The whole forms a very compact and 
dense mass, which can be dug up only by the pick-axe. The 
bed has been struck only in two places, about eight rods 
apart, in attempts to sink wells. At the eastern place the 
bed was found only three or four feet below the surface; at 
the western, about eight feet, and was penetrated ten or twelve 
et. As there seemed to be no prospect of finding water in 
this clay, the digging was stopped. This pit or well was 
about twenty feet in diameter. These facts prove that the 
bed is extensive. While the quart on the surface appears in 
_*This easy fusibility wil of course prevent this substance from. be- 
Used as a porcelam clay, unless it should be corrected by the addi- 
ire 
he same vitreous ture and delicate transiucence which distinguish porce- 
lain from common earthen ware; but any considerable softening would de- 
stroy the symmetry of the yessels.—Ep. 
